Kurt Philip Behm

Overdrive (+1)

Shifting into tomorrow,

today passing through the exhaust

The RPM’s marking time and space

—direction all but lost

 

(Dreamsleep: February, 2021)

 

 

Until

 

Time is a drug,

both good and bad

 

Infecting and curing,

the happy sad

 

Time is a stipend,

to cash at will

 

Its fund ever spending

—to last until

 

(The New Room: February, 2021)

 

 

 

 

Touched By A Demon

 

Dancing with the devil.

we waltzed across the floor

 

Past the spot the band was playing,

through the open door

 

The darkness called to him by name,

he answered with a smile

 

And looked at me and said: “This way,

damnations forked turnstile”

 

With one step back, I bid him true,

to leave me on my way

 

The voices growing louder still,

of those past gone astray

 

He stopped and said: “You now must jump,

this ledge all sinner’s pass”

 

And pointed down to the abyss,

the inferno’s deep morass

 

He looked away, his head was down,

while shouting dark and vile

 

A chant so foul, demonic born,

my soul at once beguiled

 

Before he stopped, I took both hands,

and pushed him from behind

 

And watched him fall into the void,

among his liken kind

 

Then walking back toward the dance,

I heard the music play

 

His words to music ringing out,

my spirit disarrayed

 

Once back inside I looked around,

and watched the dancers flee

 

And knew at once the way they ran

—that devil now was me

 

(Villanova Pennsylvania: February, 2017)